Friday, December 10, 2010

Response (in Words and Actions) to the Vehement Criticisms of Geocentrists "johnmartin" and "juscot"

Christians ought to avoid mud fights

Color Code:

Rick DeLano: green
juscot: purple
johnmartin: red

[all geocentrists]

Tell you what, Dave. Let's you and I set an example here and now for the whole Catholic blogosphere. Let's agree that we will both eschew personally, and condemn generally whenever they are employed, deprecatory characterizations of the proponents of either side of this issue. Let us agree that we will both admonish those of either persuasion who descend to ad hominem or defamatory insinuations concerning the motivations of their opponents.If you're in, Dave, then I'm in. I am all for the occasional rhetorical zinger, mind you, but I am willing to forego this pleasure if the result is a debate focused strictly on the issues, and not on the personalities or personal histories of the participants. . . .

I have said before, and I believe Bob entirely agrees, that no one should be considered less of a Catholic for disbelieving the Church's ancient teaching on geocentrism, until the Church Herself should deign to issue clarification on the state of development, if any, of the doctrine.

Sounds great to me, Rick. That has always been my policy. I haven't called y'all nothing but geocentrists, which is what you call yourself. Remember, we are not saying that you are somehow in trouble with the magisterium and tradition because you believe as you do. That is what is being said of us. So there is that taint of heterodoxy that I don't care for one bit, seeing what I have chosen to do with my life and life's work (often with no little cost involved). Bob decided to run me down personally; disparage my apostolate. I didn't start that, and I continue to abstain from it.

So the upshot of all this is, charity must prevail, but the church teaching on the moving earth has been condemned as heresy. This is the current position and faithful Catholics must give their assent. . . . Dave, I very much appreciate your apologetic works, but on this issue of geocentrism you are not well versed. That’s not a condemnation of your abilities in any way. . . . You are a first rate Catholic apologist who has a void in his knowledge on the matter of geo, particularly pertaining to the scientific evidence. . . . I still think you are a champion man Dave . . . a real champion.

It only shows me the anti geos have nothing to say on the topic so they attack the author.

This controversy flared up after I posted a piece called Critiques of Geocentrism (Links Page). "johnmartin" immediately put up seven fairly lengthy replies. In and of itself that was fine, but there is a history here of geocentrists trying to take over my comboxes in an effort to overwhelm any opposition (with frequent use of strong personal attacks, which is forbidden by the rules of my blog).

(11-10-10: "Dave if you and Mark Shea are going to teach evolutionism, old earth creationism, and you and yor buddies ridicule Catholics who believe in the traditional doctrines of the faith, your credentials as a Catholic apologist needs to be questioned if not outright denied by those of s who accept the true faith." -- typos left intact [see my reply])

(11-10-10: "So what if you got imprimaturs for your previous books. So many bishops are so liberal these days that an imprimature can be granted for just about anything. And as for Fr. Hardon, your appeal to authority doesn't impress me. He was orthodox as they come, but I'm willing to believe you never discussed your real views on evolution, old earth, etc with him." [see my reply one and reply two])

(11-17-10 #3: "DA, I see you have a whole list on people you will no longer interact with. Did you ever think the snarky attitude that you have displayed over the years might have something to do with it? . . . You have developed a bitter attitude toward anyone who disagrees with you. . . . bitterness is warping your feelings.")

[this concludes comments #201-400. Of these 200, johnmartin made 80 comments, so he slacked off a bit to a mere 40% of all comments made. And he had made, total, by then, 167 comments out of 400, or 42% of all comments. 45 further comments were made by other geocentrists, for a total of 212 out of 400, or 53% of all comments made]

[now the total is 446 comments, with the combox closed. johnmartin made 179 out of 446 comments, or 40% of all comments. Other geocentrists made 49 more comments, for a total of 228 comments out of 446, or 51%]

That is the record of how I allowed free speech and a full airing of both sides on my blog, despite all the insults entailed in that. Near the end of the huge mammoth discussion I wrote (later cited by johnmartin):

I believe in free speech, but not total domination of my blog by people with a very specific (and quite eccentric) agenda.

In other words, they had had their say. I allowed all that, but they were not to push the privilege too far, that I accorded to them. Nevertheless, the geocentrists started in again in the new combox for the paper, Geocentrism: Not at All an Infallible Dogma of the Catholic Church. It got up to 33 before I disabled comments (which I do only extremely rarely on my blog, and I have over 2600 posts). johnmartin had made 25 out of the 33 comments (76%). I wrote:

You have made your case in Tolstoyan proportions. If you're so confident in it then you (I assume) believe that folks can be persuaded by reading it, and would see the wrongness of the opposing view. So you oughtta be happy whatever we who disagree do. You got to exercise your free speech here. I'm also assuming you have a life apart from my comboxes . . . (11-20-10)

johnmartin,

I have repeatedly stated why I don't want to argue about geocentrism. You disagree. great. The world is full of honest disagreements. If you keep hounding me about this I will start deleting your posts. Don't wear out your welcome here. So far you (and other geocentrists) have gotten to say your piece at extreme length. There is not one word of my recent posts on Robert Sungenis' site, while right after this I will be posting for the third time his comments in e-mail to me. (11-22-10)

[johnmartin then made eight more posts]

We're done with this on my blog. I requested a cessation of the endless repeating of the same old stuff. You've written more words than there are electrons in the universe (with no end in sight). You make Tolstoy look like a Trappist monk. It has now reached absurd proportions.

My blog doesn't exist as a vehicle for anybody's obsessions. You've had your say. Now either you stop or I will strongly consider deleting all your posts and then your "platform" here will have been lost. A word to the wise . . . (11-23-10)

We're not gonna start another huge geocentric text dump here. I can always close the comments if it gets ridiculous like before. (12-17-10)

Then three more comments were made by three other geocentrists. johnmartin put in several more, and I deleted them, because he had been warned already. I wrote:

I warned about not doing a geocentric dump, so I will be deleting most of johnmartin's comments. Free speech is one thing: taking over someone's blog with an opposed (and I think, quite absurd) viewpoint, with fanatical, obsessive amounts of comments is quite another. Go make your own blog to do that or do it on one of the famous geocentric sites that are up. (12-22-10)

johnmartin is warned also to not try another dump here or I will delete what I left up of his remarks. (12-22-10) [the first seven are still posted]

Then the nonsense began, with utter predictability. First, Rick DeLano:

Dave is well advised to descend to the entirely predictable fallback position of selective deletion and censorship. I think it is indeed time to move this discussion onto more visible ground, and up the ante quite considerably. (12-22-10)

I replied:

It's not censorship at all. If someone wants to have an intelligent discussion, fine. It's far different to come to someone's blog where one is a guest, and blast a combox with scores or hundreds of posts. That is obsessive and extreme. Everyone recognizes that. It's not even relevant what the subject matter is.

. . . I allowed 446 comments on this topic (the largest ever on my blog, by far), under a post about geocentrism: probably a good half of them from johnmartin and a good majority from geocentrists, including himself. [it was 51%, as shown, with 40% coming from johnmartin alone]

Meanwhile, Bob Sungenis doesn't post one word of my answers to him on his site (even while he was asking me repeatedly to post his replies on mine). Why don't you go blast him for his lack of belief in presenting both sides?

There is a sensible limit to these things. If he comes in here and posts 50 comments at a time, they will be deleted. I don't care what you or anyone else thinks about that. It's my blog, and it is not going to be used for propagandistic purposes, for an agenda I do not agree with. (12-22-10)

Now the fun really began and the geocentric fangs (that we saw indications of all along) quickly came out. First, johnmartin made a complete fool of himself (my bolding):

Lets pull all these arguments apart and expose the anti geo camp as being anti historical, anti scientific and anti revelation. They have nothing to go on, so their position is one of prejudice.Remember we should always act with charity, yet be clear in our own argumentation and admit when we have erred. But you know what, it really doesn't matter if we make mistakes from time to time, because the bottom line is, we have the truth and the opposition does not.We can see this in the way the anti geos behave. The anti geo Catholic apologist (AGCA)is normally quite systematic in his assessment of others, who are against other Catholic doctrines, yet when it comes to the question of geo, the AGCA is anything but systematic. We have seen such examples with the behavior of others on the other recent geo thread. They make some poorly thought out arguments, then end up running away with excuses, or don't even bother to directly engage the geo arguments. Apparently anything goes with the anti geos. They can make false claims, make excuses, run away and post links to websites with rubbish arguments and then delete geo comments. Yet this doesn't seem to bother them that their anti geo position and consequent behavior betrays an anti intellectualism which is antithetical to the Catholic faith. (12-22-10)

I replied:

Very lovely, johnmartin. Thanks for exposing your bigoted mentality. Henceforth I will delete all of your comments, since this is the rank bigotry and idiotic first premises that they start with, and we engage in intelligent discussions here, not mere bigoted rantings and personal attacks.

You expressed it yourself and it is now documented on my blog. Thanks! Rarely have I seen such a transparent admission of the bigotry that underlies a person's position.

Usually it is covered up, but I guess my removal of your garbage made you angry enough to reveal your true stripes. (12-22-10)

I then closed the comments for this combox.

It is absurd for any geocentrist to now accuse me of censorship (and they have done so), in light of my allowing 228 geocentrist comments (out of 446) in one monster thread: all of which remain up, on my blog. Who is the free speech advocate and who isn't? Who it is who isn't scared to present both sides on his blog?

Bob Sungenis asked me repeatedly to post his replies to issues that were being discussed, and I was happy to do so. Eventually I asked him to please start putting his comments on his site, with links to ours, but as of writing, he has chosen not to do so. Anyone can see how I have cited his replies on my blog:

I'm the one (not Bob) who hosted on his blog a discussion with 446 comments: more than half of them geocentrist: a position I strongly oppose. All I asked was for this advocacy group to not overwhelm (or "hijack") my comboxes (i.e., in subsequent related discussions); to simply show some moderation and balance in their commenting. I warned johnmartin three times before I deleted some of his recent comments. There are still over 200 of his comments hosted on my blog (with 700-800 hits a day).

This is not a platform for their particular belief: not if it means scores and scores; maybe hundreds more comments. There is a limit to these things: especially if opposing views are peppered throughout with insults. I condemned insults on both sides, in the big discussion. That is a matter of record.

Let them keep this up if they insist. Nothing will do more damage to their Big Cause of Geocentrism as Catholic Dogma than this kind of treatment towards those of us who disagree with them. We're not Catholics (or not orthodox, obedient ones), we're fundamentally dishonest, against history, science, and revelation, because we have a disagreement on this issue? And these guys wonder why we think they are fanatical about and hyper-obsessed with geocentrism, with them now going around making out that a heliocentrist can hardly be a Catholic at all?

71 comments:

My own admittedly meager comment I wish to add to this whole excruciating affair is to make a brief statement and ask a question.

Although getting the science right is important, it seems to me that the redemption of mankind is, in fact, what makes His earth, His creation, the "center of the universe." Was it not the purpose of His creative and redemptive activity? I should think, then, that physical position and location of the heavenly bodies need not be directly and exactly analogous to the spiritual reality described for us by His revelation to us in the Scriptures. And how would we know either way if our earth is positionally smack dab in the middle of the universe? The universe is finite, being of His creation. But it is vast, and we will never know it all. It might as well be infinite to us. How can we even discuss these issues definitively in terms of physical and locational position?

Once again, as a Protestant, I see no difficulty in assessing human reason as being faulty, subject to error and in need of correction on a regular basis. As you know, I see nothing wrong with any church needing to clarify its teachings and make the necessary corrections to its understanding of God's revelation. It's not as much about the evidence that we deal with as it is about the conclusions we draw from that evidence.

Great and many blessings in Christ to you and yours this Christmas day!

I agree that incidents of perceived dishonesty from a blogger should not warrant a kind of excommunication from ecclesiastical fellowship. For example, I try to avoid erasing someone's Christian status in my mind because I think they're being unfair or dishonest. After all, we all have a great capacity to deceive ourselves about what we think and believe. In addition, we all have flaws in the way in which we communicate our ideas, and sin, in itself, continues within each of us until we're finally called home. I don't think that negates years of continuing faithfulness to one's church.

All this is to say that I think the rhetoric about your Catholic faith being in doubt is silly and over-the-top. Hopefully, that line of commentary won't be pursued further.

Other than saying that, it's not my place to get involved any further in this ongoing "discussion" than to reiterate that I am a friend and desire to see my friends treated fairly.

What science says or doesn't say on the subject is irrelevant, not only because it makes no real difference to geocentric faith, but also because Christ Jesus came to save our souls, not to teach us physics...

It's possible to take analogies too far; that is, the earth is the physical center of the universe because it's the historical/redemptive center of mankind.

It makes more sense to me that the macro universe mirrors the micro to a high degree; electrons, protons and neutrons revolving around the central nucleus of an atom seems to me to be the pattern for life. I suppose the geocentrist would say that the nucleus is the earth, and that answers that.

That the Earth is in the center of the Universe is a conclusion to which we are compelled by extremely persuasive scientific evidence.

The intelligent observer can discern just how persuasive by examining the recent literature.

The question of geostatism is now front and center, since the demise of the Copernican principle deprives mainstream science of its explanation for the failure of all terrestrial experiments to show the expected motion of the Earth in its purported orbit around the Sun.

That explanation was promulgated in the Theory of Relativity, of which the Copernican Principle is a logical consequence.

Since we now know the Copernican Principle to be false (it has been scientifically falsified by observational evidence), we have the right to demand of the mainstream an explanation for the Michelson Morley experiment that does not involve shrinking rods or time dilation.

They don't have one.

Here is an example of what the cosmologists at Stanford U are actually thinking about, as of June 21, 2010:

Geocentric cosmology: a new look at the measure problem

Excerpt:

"In the emerging picture an inﬁnite multiverse is replaced with a ﬁnite geocentric region, and the search for the correct measure is replaced by a search for a 3D Lagrangian yet to be discovered. There are two ways to look for the correct Lagrangian. One could either try to perform direct phenomenological searches or one could try to derive it from ﬁrst principles. For the phenomenological approach one has to reinterpret the existing cosmological data from the geocentric view point."

Needless to say, Dave and Jordanes are simply out of their league here.

Thank you for your comments. I myself am completely out of touch with the science involved in these issues, as you probably have discerned.

My concern is more practical theologically as befits the behaviour of Christians while discussing these matters. I'm hoping that things will settle down a bit and that the sniping will cease so that a real dialogue can ensue. I'm quite interested in this issue now, not having given it any thought previously. Sadly, there's an awful lot of griping to wade through while trying to find any useful information.

I have noticed that a number of theological disputes- including great and weighty ones involving saints on both sides of the question- have brought about circumstances under which the participants began to discover their inner St. Jerome, so to speak.

But the day is certainly coming when the heat will, please God, give way to the light, and your new interest indicated above is evidence that this day is not far off.

For an initial orientation there is simply nothing better than the new, 2nd edition of "Galileo Was Wrong".

Jordanes: I hereby challenge you to a public debate on the scientific aspects of the case for geocentrism as outlined in "Galileo Was Wrong", and in the even more recent scientific literature referenced in my presentation at GeoCathCon I. This challenge will be repeated often.

There is no need to repeat the challenge. I will never publicly debate you or any other geocentrist on these pseudoscientific aspects you mention. Even if I had the scientific qualifications that would make it rational for you to challenge me to such a debate (you and I probably are roughly comparable in our scientific qualifications and background, i.e., both of us are rank amateurs at best), as I have already explained, I think debating those questions is an exercise in futility, since geocentrism is based on erroneous theology and biblical interpretation, not on science. The purported science is just a sideshow. If geocentrism is divinely revealed, it doesn't matter what science says or doesn't say on the question, because God cannot lie and cannot be mistaken about anything -- so there's no point in arguing about the purported science. Furthermore, as I said, believing or disbelieving in geocentrism has no bearing whatsoever on salvation, so it doesn't ultimately matter whether or not people disbelieve in geocentrism. No soul can be saved by knowledge of astrophysics, nor can any soul be damned by a lack of knowledge of astrophysics. The movements of heavenly bodies does not affect our eternal destinies.

Jordanes says:There is no need to repeat the challenge. I will never publicly debate you or any other geocentrist on these pseudoscientific aspects you mention.

>> Please be advised that your refusal to debate the scientific issues is to be understood as an admission on your part that you are not capable of addressing or refuting the scientific evidence posted here and on other threads.

I accept this admission, because everything you have written on the scientific side of this question since I have known you has substantiated that you are not presently capable of understanding, much less refuting, the geocentric arguments. *********************

J: Even if I had the scientific qualifications that would make it rational for you to challenge me to such a debate (you and I probably are roughly comparable in our scientific qualifications and background, i.e., both of us are rank amateurs at best), as I have already explained, I think debating those questions is an exercise in futility

>> The primary qualification for any debate is the knowledge of the subject being debated. My posts stand here, on many other sites across the internet, and my presentation at the Catholic Conference on Geocentrism is available for purchase.

I have placed my evidence in the public domain and I have, therefore, established my qualifications to enter the debate.

It is irrelevant to mewl on about qualifications, when what is required is that one address the science.

You have wisely admitted your inability to do this, and I would certainly advise Mr. Armstrong to follow suit in this regard.***********************

since geocentrism is based on erroneous theology and biblical interpretation, not on science.

>> In this you are quite wrong. All science is based, of course, upon the interpretation of observations according to philosophical assumptions. Since the geocentrists posting on these threads have accounted for each and every observation advanced as a scientific argument against geocentrism, your claim above is completely falsified.

Since you admit to lacking the background in science to address our arguments, it should not surprise us to find that you lack even the most basic understanding of what science is.****************

J:The purported science is just a sideshow.

>> Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain.........*************************

If geocentrism is divinely revealed, it doesn't matter what science says or doesn't say on the question,

>> False. It is also divinely revealed that the entire human race descends from Adam and Eve. I have recently been given an extensive lecture by a newly ordained priest who explained to me how his reading of a science book by the apostate Francisco J. Ayala had "proven" that it were impossible, as a simple matter of genetics, for the human race to have descended from any single original pair.

This heretic is a priest, sir. He was educated and ordained by an Order, the superiors of which are likewise convinced that the "scientific evidence" has a great deal indeed to do with what God has revealed.

Therefore it is a matter of some urgency that the scientific evidence concerning this issue be very thoroughly and forcefully addressed, before we wake up to find out that the Church's interpretation of Scripture on Adam and Eve, like that on geocentrism, has "evolved".

The great contribution of Dr. Sungenis has been to correctly identify the strange and anomalous case of Galileo as the defining point in the decline of Catholic confidence and vigor in defense of the Sacred Scriptures as interpreted by the Fathers.

The astonishing new scientific evidence in favor of geocentrism is highly relevant, and will continue to show the way forward for those unwilling to surrender their children's formation to heretics who have no problem at all adopting whatever flavor of the month science might adopt in opposition to Scripture and Tradition.*******************************J:because God cannot lie and cannot be mistaken about anything -- so there's no point in arguing about the purported science.

>> The question is not whether God can be mistaken. The question is whether Jordanes can be mistaken. *****************

Furthermore, as I said, believing or disbelieving in geocentrism has no bearing whatsoever on salvation,

>> The Catholic Church decided differently, when She formally condemned the propositions in 1633. It was determined to be a matter of Faith.

This determination has never been officially retracted or reversed.**********************

so it doesn't ultimately matter whether or not people disbelieve in geocentrism.

>> The Catholic Church decided differently, when She formally condemned the propositions in 1633. It was determined to be a matter of Faith. This determination has never been retracted or reversed.*******************No soul can be saved by knowledge of astrophysics, nor can any soul be damned by a lack of knowledge of astrophysics. The movements of heavenly bodies does not affect our eternal destinies.

>> But our eternal destinies depend absolutely upon whether we uphold the Truths of our Faith, including the inerrancy of Sacred Scripture, and the impermissibility of allowing any interpretation thereof against the unanimous consensus of the Fathers.

Please be advised that your refusal to debate the scientific issues is to be understood as an admission on your part that you are not capable of addressing or refuting the scientific evidence posted here and on other threads.

No thanks. I don't see any need to be advised of things that may or may not be true, and that are in any event unimportant. I didn't say I am not capable of addressing the pseudoscience of geocentrism.

I accept this admission, because everything you have written on the scientific side of this question since I have known you has substantiated that you are not presently capable of understanding, much less refuting, the geocentric arguments.

Interesting expression, "since I have known you," since we've never met or spoken in real life, only had a few internet encounters. Anyway, though I, like you, have no background in physics, and thus am not especially adept at refuting geocentrists' invalid and purportedly scientific arguments (much as you are not capable of understanding physics), nevertheless I still was able to identify a few crucial errors of yours. But that's neither here nor there, since the "science" aspect of this debate is not something I will waste my time on. For those who want or need that sort of thing, I elect to leave that to the experts, rather focusing on the real foundation of the geocentrist error, which is a religious belief, not a hypothesis of the natural sciences.

You have wisely admitted your inability to do this, and I would certainly advise Mr. Armstrong to follow suit in this regard.

If only you could see your own inability to do it . . . .

Since you admit to lacking the background in science to address our arguments, it should not surprise us to find that you lack even the most basic understanding of what science is.

Go ahead and keep telling yourself that, Mr. DeLano.

"If geocentrism is divinely revealed, it doesn't matter what science says or doesn't say on the question,"

>> False.

You're mistaken again, as usual. The natural sciences are incapable of disproving what God divinely reveals to be true, and incapable of making divinely revealed truths even more true. If God had revealed that the earth is the stationary center of the material universe around which all other celestial bodies orbit, then no Christian would need a scientist to prove it to be true on his behalf for him to know it is true, and no scientist would be able to construct a valid and true alternative explanation of the shape and form of the heavens.

It is also divinely revealed that the entire human race descends from Adam and Eve. I have recently been given an extensive lecture by a newly ordained priest who explained to me how his reading of a science book by the apostate Francisco J. Ayala had "proven" that it were impossible, as a simple matter of genetics, for the human race to have descended from any single original pair.

You're proving my point. Since God has revealed that all men are descended from the single original pair of humans Adam and Eve (as repeatedly taught through the centuries, reaffirmed by Pius XII in Humani Generis and explicitly upheld in the new Catechism of the Catholic Church), therefore we know that the natural sciences will not be capable of disproving monogenism, any more than they could disprove Christ's resurrection or His viriginal conception and birth, or Our Lady's immaculate conception, or the existence and immortality of the soul. We do not need scientists to find Adam and Eve's bones for us to know they existed and that they are our parents, just as (assuming geocentrism is divinely revealed, which it is not) we would not need physicists to tell us anything about cosmology for us to know geocentrism is true.

Therefore it is a matter of some urgency that the scientific evidence concerning this issue be very thoroughly and forcefully addressed, before we wake up to find out that the Church's interpretation of Scripture on Adam and Eve, like that on geocentrism, has "evolved".

Apples and oranges. Monogenism, unlike geocentrism, has been authoritatively reaffirmed right down to our own day. Again, unlike geocentrism, the Church has never granted her children liberty to believe or disbelieve monogenism (nor can she, since it would be fatal to the doctrine of original sin and so many other doctrines were she to abandon her doctrine of monogenism). Therefore it is necessary to explain and defend the Church's faith in monogenism in the face of confusion and error such as you describe in this newly ordained priest. But there is no need to do that for geocentrism, because the Church does not propose geocentrism as an article of faith -- and because she does not, it is in fact necessary that we not attempt to argue that it is a teaching of the Church binding on the faithful, as that confuses people and scandalises unbelievers.

The question is not whether God can be mistaken. The question is whether Jordanes can be mistaken.

If you don't even know the answer to an easy question like that, how could we make any headway on difficult questions?

The Catholic Church decided differently, when She formally condemned the propositions in 1633. It was determined to be a matter of Faith.

It was asserted to be, not "determined" to be -- and neither infallibly nor irreformably. Furthermore, the condemnation of which you speak came in 1616 -- what happened in 1633 was a condemnation of Galileo. And even then the Church permitted her children to correctly affirm that the pope had not issued an anti-Copernican definition. This is why the popes later reversed the acts of 1616.

This determination has never been officially retracted or reversed.

On the contrary, the 1616 decree of the Index was mitigated in 1741 and nullified during the Canon Settele affair in 1820.

But our eternal destinies depend absolutely upon whether we uphold the Truths of our Faith, including the inerrancy of Sacred Scripture, and the impermissibility of allowing any interpretation thereof against the unanimous consensus of the Fathers.

That's all true -- but disbelief in geocentrism does not raise any problems for the doctrine of biblical inerrancy, and the Church is unaware of any unanimous consenus of the Fathers proposing geocentrism as an article of faith.

"If the progress of science showed later that that conception of the world rested on no sure foundation, that the spheres imagined by our ancestors did not exist, that nature, the number and course of the planets and stars, are not indeed as they were then thought to be, still the fundamental principle remained that the universe, whatever be the order that sustains it in its parts, is the work of the creating and preserving sign of Omnipotent God, who moves and governs all, and whose glory risplende in una parte piu e meno altrove; and though this earth on which we live may not be the centre of the universe as at one time was thought, it was the scene of the original happiness of our first ancestors, witness of their unhappy fall, as too of the Redemption of mankind through the Passion and Death of Jesus Christ." (Pope Benedict XV, In Praeclara Summorum 4)

"The unshrinking defense of the Holy Scripture, however, does not require that we should equally uphold all the opinions which each of the Fathers or the more recent interpreters have put forth in explaining it; for it may be that, in commenting on passages where physical matters occur, they have sometimes expressed the ideas of their own times, and thus made statements which in these days have been abandoned as incorrect. Hence, in their interpretations, we must carefully note what they lay down as belonging to faith, or as intimately connected with faith -- what they are unanimous in. For 'in those things which do not come under the obligation of faith, the Saints were at liberty to hold divergent opinions, just as we ourselves are,' according to the saying of St. Thomas. And in another place he says most admirably: 'When philosophers are agreed upon a point, and it is not contrary to our faith, it is safer, in my opinion, neither to lay down such a point as a dogma of faith, even though it is perhaps so presented by the philosophers, nor to reject it as against faith, lest we thus give to the wise of this world an occasion of despising our faith.' The Catholic interpreter, although he should show that those facts of natural science which investigators affirm to be now quite certain are not contrary to the Scripture rightly explained, must nevertheless always bear in mind, that much which has been held and proved as certain has afterwards been called in question and rejected. And if writers on physics travel outside the boundaries of their own branch, and carry their erroneous teaching into the domain of philosophy, let them be handed over to philosophers for refutation." (Pope Leo XIII, Providentissimus Deus 19)

J: Anyway, though I, like you, have no background in physics, and thus am not especially adept at refuting geocentrists' invalid and purportedly scientific arguments (much as you are not capable of understanding physics), nevertheless I still was able to identify a few crucial errors of yours.

>>You have identified none, including in the memorable debate over on Rorate Coeli where your ill-advised recourse to the threadbare "epicycles" argument so memorably blew up in your face.****************

But that's neither here nor there, since the "science" aspect of this debate is not something I will waste my time on.

>> You have wasted a great deal of your time on it already, but chin up! It was not a waste. It allowed us to demolish several typical straw man arguments of the "epicycles" type.

All such opportunities are helpful in allowing the casual observer a chance to work through these issues.

The rapid growth of interest and defense of geocentrism in these debates is quite obvious, and I have made it a point to sincerely thank Mr. Armstrong for what he has done to assist this.

I wish now to extend similar thanks to you in this regard.*****************************

J: For those who want or need that sort of thing, I elect to leave that to the experts, rather focusing on the real foundation of the geocentrist error, which is a religious belief, not a hypothesis of the natural sciences.

>> The experts are already way ahead of you, Jordanes.

For example, experts in cosmology at Stanford University on June 21, 2010, published yet another paper exhibiting the actual impact among cosmologists of the astonishingly geocentric observations obtained by, for example, the Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe:

Geocentric cosmology: a new look at the measure problem

Excerpt:

"In the emerging picture an inﬁnite multiverse is replaced with a ﬁnite geocentric region, and the search for the correct measure is replaced by a search for a 3D Lagrangian yet to be discovered. There are two ways to look for the correct Lagrangian. One could either try to perform direct phenomenological searches or one could try to derive it from ﬁrst principles. For the phenomenological approach one has to reinterpret the existing cosmological data from the geocentric view point."

Here is another, from Oxford University's Timothy Clifton, published in 2008:

"A fundamental presupposition of modern cosmology is the Copernican Principle; that we are not in a central, or otherwise special region of the Universe. Studies of Type Ia supernovae, together with the Copernican Principle, have led to the inference that the Universe is accelerating in its expansion. The usual explanation for this is that there must exist a ‘Dark Energy’, to drive the acceleration. Alternatively, it could be the case that the Copernican Principle is invalid, and that the data has been interpreted within an inappropriate theoretical frame-work. If we were to live in a special place in the Universe, near the centre of a void where the local matter density is low, then the supernovae observations could be accounted for without the addition of dark energy.”---Timothy Clifton, Pedro G. Ferreira, and Kate Land 2008Oxford Astrophysics, Physics, DWB, Keble Road, Oxford, OX13RH, UK http://arxiv.org/pdf/0807.1443v2

There are many many others, including several dozen which I cite and quote in my presentation at the Catholic Conference on Geocentrism.

Your problem, Jordanes, is that you simply aren''t up to speed with the latest developments in cosmological observations.

Actually, on second thought, that is not your problem.

We have solved that problem for you.

Your problem is a willful refusal to address these findings.

It is almost as if your pride demands of you the reprehensible tactic of burying your head in the sand and simply ignoring the evidence when presented to you.

What an awful thing.

I hope you can escape from this awful habit of mind.

We certainly intend to see to it that as many Catholics as possible are given the opportunity not to develop such a terrible habit.

J: Since God has revealed that all men are descended from the single original pair of humans Adam and Eve (as repeatedly taught through the centuries, reaffirmed by Pius XII in Humani Generis and explicitly upheld in the new Catechism of the Catholic Church), therefore we know that the natural sciences will not be capable of disproving monogenism

>> Sorry pal. The natural sciences *already* claim to have disproved it, and they have apostates like Ayala turning priests into heretics with these arguments, which you insist we develop no response to, since it is enough that the magisterium has pronounced on the question.

But it is of course true that the magisterium also pronounced on the question of heliocentrism, which it declared to be heretical, and of the motion of the Earth, which it declared to be erroneous in Faith. These findings have never been reversed, and the recent, *shocking and astonishing* observation which show a geocentric orientation in the largest scale structure of the Universe, ought to fill us with awe at the Divine providence of the Holy Spirit in preventing the Church's magisterium from reversing or repudiating this Scriptural teaching of geocentrism, and its unanimous consensus among the Fathers.

Can you imagine what a catastrophe it would have been for the magisterium to have taught that geocentrism was an error, just in time for the space probes to go up and report back the astonishing evidence of a geocentric structure across the entirety of the visible cosmos?

Jordanes, you are the one who is attempting to deny Scripture, the Fathers, and the magisterium here.

Your entire argument boils down to an implicit claim that unless a given doctrine is taught- how often? you do not say; how strongly? why, as strongly as Jordanes thinks it ought to be taught- in other words, unless a doctrine suits Jordanes' own private determination of its adequacy, then he considers himself arbitrarily at liberty to ignore Scripture, a unanimous consensus of the Fathers, and a formal and binding act of the magisterium of the Church.

And why?

Because he thinks the Church would be embarrassed by geocentrism.

Pal, the Holy Spirit is a whole bunch smarter than you, and is in fact to be greatly praised for His Wisdom in *preserving the Church* from the terrible error of imagining that science had disproven the geocentric universe of Scripture, Tradition, and the ordinary magisterium.

We ought to be astonished and humbled at this vindication of our Holy Faith.

It is certainly my intention, and the intention of my co-thinkers, to proclaim these great victories of our Holy Faith!

J: Any more than they could disprove Christ's resurrection or His viriginal conception and birth, or Our Lady's immaculate conception, or the existence and immortality of the soul.

>> All of which they do claim to have disproven, and all of which claimed disproofs have been the subject of continually improved and effective counter-arguments.

Just as the present, brilliant expose of science's terrible error in adopting the Copernican Principle in order to demote Scripture's truthful account of creation to the status of an edited Mesopotamian creation myth has been made the subject of an incredibly powerful and sophisticated counterattack in the form of "Galileo Was Wrong".

The duty of the Catholic is to *defend the Scriptures and the Faith*, Jordanes, especially in this age where the faith of millions is being undermined by the scientific juggernaut which spuriously advances its claims to have identified errors in Scripture and the catholic Church's ancient and apostolic Tradition.

For example, the astonishing evidence related in posts above, concerning the very latest deep space observations, show that the magisterium's wise condemnation of Galileo stands vindicated despite the nearly total surrender on the part of the entire world to the heliocentric myths condemned by the Papal sentence of 1633.

Our Faith stands vindicated, and it is so strange that those of us who intend to share this good news are finding that the greatest resistance is NOT found among the scientists- as we see they are very aware of these observations and are already incorporating them in their scientific papers.

Instead the greatest resistance is found amongst a small cadre of........well.

J: We do not need scientists to find Adam and Eve's bones for us to know they existed and that they are our parents,

>>But we do need Catholics capable of responding effectively to the arguments of apostates like Ayala, who claim to be able to prove by genetic science that it were impossible for the human race to have descended from an original pair.

Those of us who understand this will construct and publicly advance such refutations, to the end that apostates do not falsely deceive the gullible or weak who imagine that Catholics lack the scientific ability to refute such claims.

Let us hope and pray that we will not find the Jordanes' and Dave Armstrongs of this world standing up to excoriate us for doing so.

But whether they do or not, we shall continue just the same.

J: just as (assuming geocentrism is divinely revealed, which it is not) we would not need physicists to tell us anything about cosmology for us to know geocentrism is true.

>> The very same magisterium which assures us of the truth of Adam and Eve also assures us of the Truth of Scripture, which is explicitly geocentric, just as the Papal Sentence of 1633 explicitly affirms with binding effect.

The magisterium has never reversed either teaching, although the success of some in ignoring the 1633 affirmation of the Faith of Scripture concerning the geocentric nature of the cosmos is being duplicated by similar attempts to undermine the Faith concerning Adam and Eve.

The signs of the times are quite clear, Jordanes.

You should be assisting us, and instead you find yourself condemning us.

The rest of your assertions- basically ridiculously self-refuting claims that the Church did not in fact teach geocentrism in a formally binding manner (try telling that to Galileo why dont you)- have been thoroughly refuted many times.

I thank Mr. Armstrong for his continued hospitality.

There have been many occasions of anger and dispute between the interlocutors, but Mr. Armstrong is to be respected for his continued provision of a forum for examination of this issue.

It is my sincere wish to accommodate his stated desire to move future responses to this subject off of his blog, but I must, and I am sure Mr. Armstrong understands this, even though he disagrees with me on this issue- I must respond as long as threads remain open to those addressing the opposite side of this issue.

Jordanes- That's all true -- but disbelief in geocentrism does not raise any problems for the doctrine of biblical inerrancy, and the Church is unaware of any unanimous consenus of the Fathers proposing geocentrism as an article of faith.

JM – Jordanes believes he has come across church documents to back his claims. Jordanes clearly says “Church is unaware of any unanimous consenus of the Fathers proposing geocentrism as an article of faith”. The claim that the church is unaware is clearly not true. The church was aware enough to repeatedly condemn Galileo and officially state a moving earth was against the faith.

Jordanes- "If the progress of science showed later that that conception of the world rested on no sure foundation, that the spheres imagined by our ancestors did not exist, that nature, the number and course of the planets and stars, are not indeed as they were then thought to be, still the fundamental principle remained that the universe, whatever be the order that sustains it in its parts, is the work of the creating and preserving sign of Omnipotent God, who moves and governs all, and whose glory risplende in una parte piu e meno altrove; and though this earth on which we live may not be the centre of the universe as at one time was thought, it was the scene of the original happiness of our first ancestors, witness of their unhappy fall, as too of the Redemption of mankind through the Passion and Death of Jesus Christ." (Pope Benedict XV, In Praeclara Summorum 4)

JM – The quote above is taken from an address given to the church as a commentary on Dante and not a specific commentary on geocentrism or the binding nature of any cosmology. Furthermore the quote is merely a hypothetical, where it states “If the progress of science”, therefore the Pope has not made any official statement on cosmology in this document.

Jordanes- "The unshrinking defense of the Holy Scripture, however, does not require that we should equally uphold all the opinions which each of the Fathers or the more recent interpreters have put forth in explaining it; for it may be that, in commenting on passages where physical matters occur, they have sometimes expressed the ideas of their own times, and thus made statements which in these days have been abandoned as incorrect. Hence, in their interpretations, we must carefully note what they lay down as belonging to faith, or as intimately connected with faith -- what they are unanimous in. . . " (Pope Leo XIII, Providentissimus Deus 19)

JM – This quote merely means the individual opinions of the fathers on matters of science are not binding because those statements are not covered by the protection of the HS. This has already been discussed before and it was shown that the correct understanding of Leo is to harmonise all of his statements, including the expressed demand that the unanimous consent of the fathers is binging. As the fathers had a unanimous consent on a stationary earth, then that truth is part of the faith.

Jordanes has once again failed to make a case from church documents which overcomes the geo position that the church has formally taught a stationary earth is part of the faith.

If I'm reading you correctly, the heliocentric folks are saying that geocentrism is not an article of faith of the Catholic Church, whereas the geocentrist folks say that it is. You know that as a Protestant I have no particular dog in this hunt other than my own curiosity about what the Catholic Church's official teaching is on this.

If you have the time and are so inclined, please:

a. Demonstrate where it can be found in official Catholic writings that geocentrism is an article of faith (and by extension, necessary to salvation, perhaps)

b. Demonstrate that geocentrism is not an article of faith (and by extension, necessary to salvation, perhaps) either in official Catholic writings or silence on the issue

I think this is a crucial starting point. I seem to be getting mixed messages in the combox and would appreciate some clarification. Or perhaps I missed it in all the kerfuffle?

a. Demonstrate where it can be found in official Catholic writings that geocentrism is an article of faith (and by extension, necessary to salvation, perhaps)

>> That which pertains to the deposit of Faith is necessary for salvation. All of Sacred Scripture, belonging to the deposit of Faith, must be believed. Geocentrism is taught throughout Scripture, beginning in Genesis 1:1, where the Earth is the first object created, before the Sun, moon, and stars, and continuing throughout the Old Testament, crucially including the account of Joshua's long day (there are of course many other instances where the Sun is reported to be moving, and the Earth stationary and established by God as His footstool):

Joshua 10:12-13Then spoke Joshua to the Lord in the day when the Lord gave the Amorites over to the men of Israel; and he said in the sight of Israel, "Sun, stand thou still at Gibeon, and thou Moon in the valley of Aijalon." And the sun stood still, and the moon stayed, until the nation took vengeance on their enemies. Is this not written in the Book of Jashar? The sun stayed in the midst of heaven, and did not hasten to go down for about a whole day.

Habakkuk 3:11The sun and moon stood still in their habitation at the light of thine arrows as they sped, at the flash of thy glittering spear.

It is clear that Joshua told the Sun and moon to stand still, and did not say to the Earth that it stop spinning.

The above Scriptural truths and those additional passages referenced in passing formed the basis for the consensus of the Fathers, which in this case is completely unanimous. There are no Fathers who tell us the Earth is moving (since Scripture doesn't tell us the Earth is moving, and the Fathers believe the Scriptures rather than the Greek heliocentrists of their day).

This in turn leads us to the Councils of Trent and Vatican I, which solemnly define the teaching that *no consensus of Scripture which is in contradiction to a unanimous consensus of the Fathers is permitted*.

The reason is that patristic unanimity is considered, reasonably enough, to be a mark of apostolicity, and hence of Divine Revelation.

Council of Trent, Session IV:

“Furthermore, in order to restrain petulant spirits, It decrees, that no one, relying on his own skill, shall, in matters of faith, and of morals pertaining to the edification of Christian doctrine, wresting the sacred Scripture to his own senses, presume to interpret the said sacred Scripture contrary to that sense which holy mother Church, whose it is to judge of the true sense and interpretation of the holy Scriptures, hath held and doth hold; or even contrary to the unanimous consent of the Fathers; even though such interpretations were never intended to be at any time published.”

This in turn forms the basis upon which the Papal sentence condemning Galileo in 1633 was issued, and at the command of the Pope distributed widely throughout Europe.

Here are the propositions formally condemned:

“The proposition that the Sun is the center of the world and does not move from its place is absurd and false philosophically and formally heretical, because it is expressly contrary to Holy Scripture.The proposition that the Earth is not the center of the world and immovable but that it moves, and also with a diurnal motion, is equally absurd and false philosophically and theologically considered at least erroneous in faith.”This answers your first question, pending further inquiry.There is much more evidence available should you or anyone else desire it, including the teaching of geocentrism in the official catechism of the Council of Trent, for example.

Thank you Rick and Dave. I will take some time to look everything over and come back into the combox if I think I can add anything to the discussion or if I have (what I suspect will be) even more questions to ask.

One thing I did want to say, though, is in regard to this matter of "unanimous consent" of the fathers. In other contexts it has been demonstrated that "unanimous" (to the Protestant's view) is most often rather overstating things. However, Dave explained to me once that the use of the word "unanimous" should really be understood as a shorthand term for "majority report." (Just as in Reformed Protestantism the word "Calvinism" denotes much less a following of one man and much more a shorthand term for the general principles of a systematic theology which developed before, during and after the Reformation).

"I understand the reasoning of Jordanes, but if someone could show me this:

...the heliocentric myths condemned by the Papal sentence of 1633.

I would be grateful."

>> This was previously posted but disappeared. Let's try it again:

The Councils of Trent and Vatican I solemnly define the teaching that *no consensus of Scripture which is in contradiction to a unanimous consensus of the Fathers is permitted*.

The reason is that patristic unanimity is considered, reasonably enough, to be a mark of apostolicity, and hence of Divine Revelation.

Council of Trent, Session IV:

“Furthermore, in order to restrain petulant spirits, It decrees, that no one, relying on his own skill, shall, in matters of faith, and of morals pertaining to the edification of Christian doctrine, wresting the sacred Scripture to his own senses, presume to interpret the said sacred Scripture contrary to that sense which holy mother Church, whose it is to judge of the true sense and interpretation of the holy Scriptures, hath held and doth hold; or even contrary to the unanimous consent of the Fathers; even though such interpretations were never intended to be at any time published.”

This in turn forms the basis upon which the Papal sentence condemning Galileo in 1633 was issued, and at the command of the Pope distributed widely throughout Europe.

Here are the propositions formally condemned:

“The proposition that the Sun is the center of the world and does not move from its place is absurd and false philosophically and formally heretical, because it is expressly contrary to Holy Scripture.The proposition that the Earth is not the center of the world and immovable but that it moves, and also with a diurnal motion, is equally absurd and false philosophically and theologically considered at least erroneous in faith.”This answers your first question, pending further inquiry.There is much more evidence available should you or anyone else desire it, including the teaching of geocentrism in the official catechism of the Council of Trent, for example.

[Father Campion's] gaiety, too, was in strange contrast to the solemn Puritanism of his enemies. For instance, he was on the point that Councils might err in matters of fact, but that the Scriptures could not."As for examples," he said, his eyes twinkling out of his drawn face, "I am bound under pain of damnation to believe that Toby's dog had a tail, because it is written, he wagged it."The Deans looked sternly at him, as the audience laughed."Now, now," said one of the them, "it becomes not to deal so triflingly with matters of weight."Campion dropped his eyes, demurely, as if reproved."Why, then," he said, "if this example like you not, take another. I must believe that St. Paul had a cloak, because he willeth Timothy to bring it with him."Again the crowd laughed; and Anthony laughed, too, with a strange sob in his throat at the gallant foolery, which, after all, was as much to the point as a deal that the Deans were saying.

Yet does such a theory mean the theory has proven reality is what the theory says it is? The answer is no, simply because a theory is always only an idealized model of reality. Furthermore, even if a theory is accepted, this does not mean the theory does not have serious problems, or that there are alternative theories, which have the same, or very similar predictive results. Therefore in many instances, theories can only be used as predictive indicators of reality due to the limited knowledge available. This problem is however resolved in regard to the matter of the stationary earth, simply because God has repeatedly told man the truth of the immobile earth through the scripture, the fathers and the church.

So when science is confronted with observation which conforms to a moving earth theory, what should a faithful Catholic scientist do? Firstly, he can adopt the theory as merely a theory of science that has predictive results. In this way, the Catholic scientist does no harm to either science or the faith. Yet the Catholic scientist has a great advantage over other scientists, because he can see the value of other theories which incorporate a stationary earth into the cosmology. In this manner, the Catholic scientist can see into reality further than other scientists. For example, he can see that there must be other explanations for stellar parallax and other explanations for gravity, beyond the standard attraction of masses assumption. He can also see, as is assumed by Bellarimine, that evidence for a moving earth is NOT proof for a moving earth. Why?

1. – Data only indicates a theory may be a correct interpretation of reality, but never demonstrates the theory is the only interpretation of reality.2. – No theory can prove the contradictory of what the fathers, scripture and the Popes have taught.3. – Data may be interpreted in accordance with the truths revealed by God. For example parallax is interpreted to have stellar parallax explained by the stars being linked to the yearly movement of the sun, and gravity is interpreted as an action of the aether flow throughout the universe.

Clearly, Bellarimine’s statement requiring proof means science must go beyond itself to provide irrefutable evidence for its theory which overturns what the church had thought was revealed by God. Evidently Bellarimine was asking science to do what it could not and never can do – provide evidence to overturn a revealed truth.

Dave thinks parallax is clear evidence for a moving earth when he says “It was not solidly established, based on experiment, till the early 1800s.”, yet Dave must ignore the alternative explanations offered by the modified Tychonian model, which incorporate stellar parallax into a stationary earth model. He must also ignore the limits of science to propound the value of theory as merely a model to explain observations. He must also ignore the problem of negative parallax, which is well known at NASA, which overturns the moving earth theory. For if positive parallax is clear evidence for a moving earth, then negative parallax is clear evidence against the theory. Therefore the clear evidence is a clear invalidation of the moving earth theory.

Dave - In essence, then, it is a case where one non-magisterial tribunal of the Church was wrong about astronomy for (partially) the right reasons, and Galileo was partially right about astronomy for (partially) the wrong reasons.

JM – Dave is wrong on both accounts. History clearly shows us the official magesterium in the Popes and the unanimous consent of the fathers has forcefully taught a stationary earth. Science has and continues to show us clear evidence that is consistent with a stationary earth, thereby invalidating Galileo’s theory.

Dave - Catholic Church: Our belief is that the Church possesses infallibility in carefully defined circumstances: when something that has long been widely believed and has strong support in Scripture and Tradition, in the area of faith and morals, is declared to be infallible, by a pope, or an ecumenical council in harmony with a pope.

JM – Yes Dave, the church Popes and fathers have done just that in regard to the stationary earth. Yet you routinely ignore those statements and claim the geos are acting against the Popes and church authority. Do you see the problem here Dave?

You already have one link to Ian Musgrave, but in this one he specifically addresses Tychonian geocentrism and shows how the observations of the earth by a Mars probe prove that, when viewed from Mars, the earth does not appear to move in the way it must move if Tychonian geocentrism were true, but appears to move exactly the way it should if the solar system were heliocentric.

In the neo-Tychonic system the Earth is at the center of a hierarchy of motions.

The Moon and Sun revolve around the Earth.

The planets revolve around the Sun (which is why your Mars objection is bogus and entirely irrelevant to the debate).

The plane of the ecliptic- that is, the 23.5 degree inclination of the Sun and the planets with respect to Earth in their annual cycle of daily orbits- happens to be highly improbably aligned with the so-called "Axis of Evil" discovered to the very great shock of cosmologists studying the cosmic mocrowave background (CMB) in 2005, and dubbed by them the "Axis of Evil".

This Axis of Evil is aligned in astonishingly precise ways with:

1. The Galactic North Pole2. The ecliptic plane 3. The equinoxes

The complete ensemble of such orientations being unlikely to a combined degree of approximately one in one hundred billion.

The only cosmology which ever proposed a cosmic significance to that 23.5 degree angle of inclination is neo-Tychonic geocentrism, which incorporated it *long before the discovery of the Axis in the CMB* as the plane of rotation for all the stars, the Sun, and the planets.

This astonishing information was the subject of the concluding section of my presentation at the GeoCathCon I this November.

It is now known to cosmologists that all the cosmic background energy, the so-called "oldest light in the Universe", the fingerprint of the Big Bang itself, so it is said- is aligned in precise and astonishing ways with one and particularly one location in all the Universe:

You guessed it.

Ours.

The interested reader will find much to ponder here:

“The probability that each of these (alignments) would happen by chance...as they are all independent and all involve primarily the quadrupole and octopole..... represent(s) a ∼ 10 −8 probability chance “ﬂuke” in the two largest scale modes......’We ﬁnd it hard to believe that these correlations are just statistical ﬂuctuations.”---The Uncorrelated Universe: Statistical Anisotropy and the Vanishing Angular Correlation Function in WMAP Years 1-3 Corpi, Huterer, et al http://arxiv.org/pdf/astro-ph/0605135v2

With regard to just the quadrupole and octupole alignments with the ecliptic and equinoxes, the authors state:

“The < 1◦ alignment in our sky appears to be quite improbable based upon random simulations of the best-ﬁt ΛCDM model. A resolution level 7 map has 196,608 pixels of about 0.5◦ diameter. The best ﬁt alignment axis speciﬁes two pixels directly opposite each other on the sphere. The probability of two axes randomly aligning in the same pair of pixels is then 2/196608 = 0.001%. The probability of getting an alignment within 0.25◦ of a given axis is 0.00095%, which is close to 0.001% above.”

Ahem.

That would be 99.999% improbable under mainstream assumptions, ladies and gentlemen.

So Dave and Jordanes, please be advised that your link is bogus and does not represent a refutation of the geocentric system we defend here.

If you are interested in scientific integrity and character, you will take it down.

Jordanes - As for his objections to the Musgrave link, it's irrelevant how many epicycles modern geocentrist pseudoscientists may have added to their modified Tychonian system:

JM – The modified Tychonian (MT) system is very different to the Tychonian system. The MT has the earth stationary and the sun orbit the earth once per solar day. The other planets orbit the sun as the centre of their motions with the same velocity relative to the sun and position relative to the sun, as they have in the helio model. In this way, the MT model doesn’t have any epicycles at all. So for Jordanes to say “it's irrelevant how many epicycles modern geocentrist pseudoscientists may have added to their modified Tychonian system” means Jordanes has absolutely no idea what the MT system is at all. Jordanes is then either acting out of complete ignorance of the system, and therefore he should investgate the system before searching the net for a false/old form of geocentrism, long since abandoned, or he knows of the MT system and is not telling us the truth.

Jordanes - the observations from Mars show that the earth is not stationary, contrary to the false religious doctrine they advocate. Musgrave obviously knows that in a Tychonian system, the planets orbit the sun, which orbits a stationary earth -- and he explained what the motions of the earth should appear to be from Mars if the solar system were Tychonian, and showed that the earth isn't doing what it should do if the planets orbit the sun, which orbits a stationary earth.

JM – Musgrave is talking about a Tychonian model that has been abandoned even by modern geocenrists. So making a link to a commentary on an abandoned model is moot. More to the point, Musgrave also makes a link to a discussion by Todd Wood, who apparently attended the conference. When reading Woods comments, he is actually positive about some of the points discussed in the conference. No doubt the MT model was presented for all to see at the conference and it should have occurred to Musgrave to correctly present the MT model before attempting to pull apart the modern geo model.

Musgrave, like Jordanes has utterly failed to critique modern geo, because of his failure to correctly present to the model. Take a look for yourselves at the model presented in Roberts electronic version of GWW to see the MT model and compare it to Musgrave’s tychonain system. The two models are very different.

I believe that much of the opposition to geo is merely based upon pseudoscience pushed on the net, by those who do not have access to the MT model or have not read GWW. Once the motions of the MT model are seen in GWW, misdirected objections such as that of Musgrave are simply not worthy of consideration.

JORDANES SAYS:Dave, just in case anybody gives credence to the claim, "Jordanes has been informed dozens of times that this "Tychonian system" is several centuries out of date," let me make clear that that's a serious exaggeration.

Try not even one dozen times, if that.

>> In any case, you will now enjoy a well deserved and very long awaited victory, because I have made a blunder.

It is not a gigantic blunder, or one which involves any error in the scientific defense of geocentrism.

It is one of those blunders that really wouldn't even amount to a hill of beans,,,EXCEPT for the fact that I managed to preface my blunder with a claim that you were guilty of either "ignorance or dishonesty".

It turns out you were guilty of neither.

Instead I was guilty of failing to fully examine a linked post before undertaking its refutation.

So never let it be said I do not know how to take my medicine.

So pull up a chair all you anti geocentrists, you are going to enjoy this one.

First, some necessary background.

The blog to which Jordanes posted his link had posted a previous, botched attempt at refuting geocentrism, which can be found here:

It was *this* post which contained a basic error, related to the ecliptic to which I referred in my above post.

The author states:

"....record the passage of Sunspots over the Suns face, over the 5-6 months you are recording the susposts, you will notice the path taken by the sunspots moves up and down. This is due to the Earths orbit not being exactly in the plane of the Suns rotation."

(It is, instead, due to the Sun's orbit not being exactly in the plane of the Earth's equator. As Einstein has already told us, the two cases are precisely the same, in terms of relative motion).

Think about it for a moment.

We are watching the Sun move, day after day, across the Earth's sky, and it appears each day on the horizon at a point slightly different from the point at which it appeared the day before.

Therefore the sunspots will *of course* also move just that same slight tiny little bit up or down every day, *since the Sun is doing exactly the same thing*!

But the observer would not *notice* the movements of the sunspots in his viewing apparatus on a daily basis, since they are so small.

Only over the 5-6 month period would the movement up or down of the sunspots (and hence, of course, of the *the Sun itself*) have become significantly noticeable.

What we have just described is a little thing called "the seasons".

We don't notice the change every day, but over six months we certainly notice that the day is much longer or much shorter, and this is *all that the author's experiment shows*!

Since this was such an obvious refutation, I confess that I did not bother to take this author's new post seriously, and instead simply assumed he was making the same elementary mistake.

But this time his above error is not applicable, since we are no longer talking about the motion of the Sun with respect to the Earth, but instead of Mars with respect to Earth.

Therefore my original post does not constitute an adequate refutation of the claim advanced by Jordanes.

I will attend to the refutation of this *new* post tomorrow.

In the meantime I humbly beg pardon of Jordanes and Dave for having departed from rigorous scientific accuracy and attention to detail in this debate, for the first time, and, I promise to the very utmost of my ability, for the last.

My error was the consequence of a too-quick assumption that the new post would be based on the same error as the old.

Nonetheless I am reminded of the salutary admonition of Scripture that pride cometh before a fall, and I promise to fully and thoroughly examine and refute all posts against geocentrism, starting with this new one, only after a thorough and careful review of same.

As to the new post from Ian Musgrave, suggested by Jordanes to Dave for inclusion on his anti-geo links.

The same author's first attempt was substantively refuted in my post above- by the way all the anti-geo posts linked to by Dave and Jordanes will be thoroughly refuted in detail on the gww.blogspot.com site- you can already see refutation of many of the anti-geo links there now, and more will be coming in the next few days).

Musgrave's claim is presented here:

"There is a big difference that would be immediately apparent."

>> This is false. As Einstein has already demonstrated, there will be no observable difference between the motions of the heavenly bodies in the HC or GC framework:

"The struggle, so violent in the early days of science, between the views of Ptolemy and Copernicus would then be quite meaningless. Either CS [coordinate system] could be used with equal justification. The two sentences, 'the sun is at rest and the earth moves', or 'the sun moves and the earth is at rest', would simply mean two different conventions concerning two different CS [coordinate systems]."---"The Evolution of Physics: From Early Concepts to Relativity and Quanta, Albert Einstein and Leopold Infeld, New York, Simon and Schuster 1938, 1966 p.212

So we know right away that Ian's example is going to fail, just as all the others have failed, and for the same reason.

The motions are relative, and can be described equally under either coordinate system- the helio or the geo.

All that is left is to pull Ian's argument apart and find out where he makes his error of assumption, just as we did with his first, mistaken attempt yesterday.

Musgrave continues:

"""Whether in the Tychonian or Heliocentric systems, from the point of view from Mars, Earth would appear to be a morning or evening star that appeared to revolve around the Sun."

>> No difference so far..........*******************

IM: "However, the geocentricists are using a geostationary model, where the 24 hour day is produced by the Sun rotating about the Earth.

>> Along with Mars. Let’s not forget that little detail.........*******************

IM: So in a period of 24 hours, an observer on Mars (armed with an occultation disk) would see Earth rise from the sun, then fall back, then reappear on the other side of the sun and repeat the process again.

>> No he wouldn't. Obviously. Ian has made the error of failing to include Mars' motion *along with* the Sun's.

The Neo-Tychonic (NT) system has the Sun with period 24.00000 hrs and Mars with 24 +- epsilon , where epsilon is the small daily correction for the Mars orbit around the Sun.

Therefore- as seen from Mars, the Earth and Sun differ by only epsilon each day, since Mars is orbiting Earth with the Sun.

Now Ian will elaborate his straw man, and all subsequent claims will be based on his simple error above.

IM: "For the Earth to move from maximum elongation to inferior or superior conjunction (at least, as it would appear from Mars, because in the Tychonian system Earth can't have conjunctions) takes 6 hours (in a 24 hour day there will be four 6 hour segments as the Earth goes out, comes back, goes out and comes back again from the solar disk).

>> Obviously absurd. Mars has a synodic period of 780 days. The synodic period of Mars is precisely the same under the Tychonic and heliocentric systems. If we look at the animation model provided in Ian's post, we can see that immediately, just by clicking back and forth between the models.

Ian’s above claim would depend upon Mars viewing an Earth with the Sun going around it every 24 hours, *without taking into account that Mars is also moving with the Sun*.********************Finally Ian says:

"you can see the image of Earth is slightly elongated. However, remember that Mars rotates, and any 15 second exposure will cause slight star trailing due to its rotation."

>> Ian uses "elongation" to refer to two quite different things here......this above use of the term has nothing to do with the positions of Earth or Mars, but instead merely with the effects of time-lapse photography.*************

IM: "The trail we see of Earth is nothing like what we would expect if it was moving to a 24 hour rhythm"

>> To the contrary. We would expect to see exactly the same star trailing observed in the linked photograph under the heliocentric *and* the Tychonic system. As Ian himself just finished telling us:

"remember that Mars rotates, and any 15 second exposure will cause slight star trailing due to its rotation".*******************

IM: "Still, for confirmation we have to check Earth's movement against that of the background stars."

>> Since in the NT system the background stars are moving right along with Mars and the Sun, we would expect the star trailing from Mars' point of view to be the result of.........Mars rotation on its axis of course!********************Fortunately, in the original image there is a background star just above Earth (it's best seen in the TIF file). It has the same degree of elongation that the Earth does.

>> It has the same elongation? Why, how remarkable. Therefore the elongation of Earth and background star are *both* caused by the same thing: Mars' rotation on its axis!*********************

This falsifies the Tychonian system, thus the solar system is heliocentric.

JORDANES:What if the Catholic Church and modern physicists are right, and the geocentrists wrong? That's unthinkable to a committed geocentrist . . . .

>> Actually, it is the Catholic self-appointed anti geo Posse that has the problem with modern physicists, many of whom are frankly acknowledging and incorporating the geocentric hypothesis in their most recent attempts to ideal with the astonishing new geocentric evidence from deep space surveys and the WMAP.

Here, for example, is a paper published by experts in cosmology at Stanford University on June 21, 2010:

Geocentric cosmology: a new look at the measure problem

Excerpt:

"In the emerging picture an inﬁnite multiverse is replaced with a ﬁnite geocentric region, and the search for the correct measure is replaced by a search for a 3D Lagrangian yet to be discovered. There are two ways to look for the correct Lagrangian. One could either try to perform direct phenomenological searches or one could try to derive it from ﬁrst principles. For the phenomenological approach one has to reinterpret the existing cosmological data from the geocentric view point."

Here is another, from Oxford University's Timothy Clifton, published in 2008:

"Alternatively, it could be the case that the Copernican Principle is invalid, and that the data has been interpreted within an inappropriate theoretical frame-work. If we were to live in a special place in the Universe, near the centre of a void where the local matter density is low, then the supernovae observations could be accounted for without the addition of dark energy.”---Timothy Clifton, Pedro G. Ferreira, and Kate Land 2008Oxford Astrophysics, Physics, DWB, Keble Road, Oxford, OX13RH, UK http://arxiv.org/pdf/0807.1443v2

Your problem, Jordanes, continues to be a failure to substantively address these findings.

I have substantively addressed yours.

Perhaps the truth is, instead, that it is unthinkable to Jordanes that Scripture, the Fathers, and the magisterium had it right all along, and the physicists are beginning to find this out the hard way........

Your problem, Jordanes, continues to be a failure to substantively address these findings.

Nope. I have no need to address those "findings" at all, since, as Sts. Augustine and Thomas Aquinas have explained, whether or not the universe is geocentric or heliocentric or acentric has no bearing on the Catholic faith. It's only those who believe the Church has staked out a perpetually binding position on this question who need to try to explain the findings and come up with a way to make everything fit with what they think the Bible says and what the Church supposedly believes. As long as their explanations don't contradict biblical inerrancy and the teachings of the Church, and don't throw stumblingblocks in the paths of unbelievers by misleading them into thinking the Church teaches something it doesn't, they are free to offer their speculations. That's the fatal error of Catholic geocentrism: the false claim that God revealed it and therefore all must believe it, despite the fact that the Church for two centuries or more has granted her children liberty to disbelieve it.

Perhaps the truth is, instead, that it is unthinkable to Jordanes that Scripture, the Fathers, and the magisterium had it right all along

Wrong again. I have no doubt that Scripture, the Fathers, and the Magisterium had it right all along, and still have it right -- and I'm grateful to God that He insured that the Church didn't fall into the error of infallibly defining geocentrism as divinely-revealed truth, and that the Church made the right decision in granting an imprimatur to Canon Settele's book and reprimanded those who erroneous attributed an authority to the 1616 and 1633 Galileo judgments that the Church never said they had.

Perhaps we could have a private discussion concerning how such a resolution might come about?

Feel free. You know my e-mail, I think. If not, it is listed on the sidebar, by my profile. Click on the link with the feather pen.

And please write to me alone: no one else. I will NOT put any of that on my blog, since that is indeed private correspondence. Obviously you would talk to Bob about it, which is fine, but if we actually negotiate, I don't want anyone else in that, so that I have to deal with a stupid clique again.

And know beforehand -- going into any "negotiations" -- that I will not bend and start removing responses unless ALL these public attacks against my apostolate and myself are removed from public view.

Thus far, Bob has repeatedly denied that he has attacked me personally, or my apostolate at all. So that is the hurdle we have to overcome from the outset (from my perspective).

I also have plans already to post at least one reply from David Palm where he defends himself against dubious public statements made by Bob as well.

I say that so that you will know it was already planned, and is not to be construed as some "payback" on my (or his) part, should our "talks" go sour.

David has just as much right to defend his name and character as I do: having now been the recipient of several public attacks from Bob, just as I have.

THAT is free speech and "both sides." You guys love it when I allow you to post 300-400 comments on my blog, so it is just as fair to let David defend himself and use my blog to do it, since this stuff has been such an issue here as of late.

The unanimous consent of the fathers constitutes part of the ordinary magesterium, which means when the fathers are unanimous on the stationary earth; the doctrine is binding and infallible.

Clearly the church has infallibly taught the doctrine of the stationary earth and for the anti-geos to take the opposite position means they are acting against church teaching. Clearly, Frank, Jordanes and anyone who says the church has not infallibly defined the doctrine of the stationary earth is in error.

Frank - Jordanes thank you for bringing this back to some rock principles. And it was not just St. Augustine and St. Thomas. Their teaching has been made the universal teaching of the Church by Popes Leo XIII and Pius XII. The Holy Ghost just did not put information about gecentrism or heliocentrism or any centrism in Scripture. It is not a matter of Faith. And the unanimous Fathers (even if they were unanimous which we saw on another thread that they are not) only bind on matters of faith and morals.

JM – Again this has already been discussed at length on another thread, where this position was answered in full. In short Augustine and Thomas were geos and taught as much. Furthermore, when Popes Leo XIII and Pius XII made statements about the church fathers on matters of science which are not binding on the faithful, they were referring to individual opinions of the fathers and never the unanimous consent of the fathers. Frank has once again proven my conclusion that the anti-geo’s thinks they can routinely ignore Papal statements and the teaching of scripture and tradition.

J: "It's only those who believe the Church has staked out a perpetually binding position on this question who need to try to explain the findings and come up with a way to make everything fit with what they think the Bible says and what the Church supposedly believes."

>> "supposedly" believes? Here is what the Church definitely believes, since, as opposed to the opinions of Jordanes, this is a formal Papal sentence in a canonical trial against a suspected heretic:

"We say, pronounce, sentence, and declare that you, the said Galileo, by reason of the matters adduced in trial, and by you confessed as above, have rendered yourself in the judgment of this Holy Office vehemently suspected of heresy, namely, of having believed and held the doctrine—which is false and contrary to the sacred and divine Scriptures—that the Sun is the center of the world and does not move from east to west and that the Earth moves and is not the center of the world; and that an opinion may be held and defended as probably after it has been declared and defined to be contrary to the Holy Scripture"

That is the Holy Office speaking, authoritatively as all get out.

Jordanes, you have no comparable, heaven-protected magisterial authority to gainsay them.

The difference in quality between our respective arguments is seen again.

You blow smoke.

I cite authoritative sources.****************************J: As long as their explanations don't contradict biblical inerrancy and the teachings of the Church, and don't throw stumblingblocks in the paths of unbelievers by misleading them into thinking the Church teaches something it doesn't, they are free to offer their speculations.

>> The above sentence applies precisely to you, Jordanes. We know the Church has officially taught geocentrism, and has never taught heliocentrism. So stop misleading people to the contrary. Under these circumstances you can freely offer your speculations, even though the modern cosmological community is confronting some rather daunting new evidence which you really really really ought to get aropund to grappling with instead of tossing out more heliocentric pizza.**********************

J: That's the fatal error of Catholic geocentrism: the false claim that God revealed it

>> False claim? This is grotesque. Of course God revealed it. The Holy Office itself has just told us so:

"the doctrine—which is false and ******contrary to the sacred and divine Scriptures*******—that the Sun is the center of the world and does not move from east to west and that the Earth moves and is not the center of the world; and that an opinion may be held and defended as probably ******after it has been declared and defined to be contrary to the Holy Scripture*******"

That is what the Church says about this debate, Jordanes.

It is profoundly revealing of the underlying weakness of your position that you continue to blow smoke while I continue to cite the magisterial acts of the Holy Church.*******************J:and therefore all must believe it, despite the fact that the Church for two centuries or more has granted her children liberty to disbelieve it.

>> This is the core fallacy of your position. No doctrine of the Church is overturned because it is abandoned in practice. The Church did not abandon her canon of Scripture even though it was left undefined for 15 centuries, until Cajetan's challenge led to the formal definition at Trent.

But Trent did not establish the canon, Trent merely formalized the constant apostolic tradition of the Fathers.

Just as the Holy Office did in its 1633 condemnation of heliiocentrism.

The Church has never reversed this magisterial teaching of the ordinary magisterium, and in fact can never reverse it, since it represents a unanimous consensus of the Fathers.

This being said, the unique and anomalous case of Galileo- precisely *because* of the scientific arguments used to falsely claim a "proof" of heliocentrism- certainly presents us with grounds to avoid any tendency to impute guilt to any individual Catholic based upon their honest ignorance of these facts.

It is important, especially now that *all* heliocentric "proofs" have been demolished, to encourage the Church to clarify this matter, and it is perfectly legitimate for us geocentrists to contribute to the necessary climate for that clarification.

It is, after all, a tremendously exciting and inspiring triumph of our Faith to see the scientific community looking out at a Universe which is geocentric in its largest scale structures------

just as Scripture, the Fathers, and Tradition have always held it would be.

"JM – Hoge was substantially answered here - http://socrates58.blogspot.com/2010/11/robert-sungenis-opts-for-personal.html?showComment=1288956818132#c7093827402186539973 where I asked for someone to check out my arguments and make a response."

And I pointed out that your "response" totally misrepresented Hoge's argument. Hoge agreed that hypothetically for one instant in time the earth might be the center of mass of the universe. But his whole argument, which neither you nor Sungenis came close to touching, was that it [b]would not stay there[/b]. Your little equation totally missed the point and if you can not admit at least that then it will say a lot.

"Scripture clearly teaches a stationary earth and as the scriptures are infallible, then so too, the doctrine of the stationary earth is infallible. The church fathers clearly are unanimous on a stationary earth."

And it was shown in that same discussion that only one Father, ONE Father actually cited Scripture about a stationary earth. See it here http://socrates58.blogspot.com/2010/11/robert-sungenis-opts-for-personal.html?showComment=1290047070789#c3146692978619365024. Quite a few more than that quoted Greek philosophers. What sort of a unanimous consent is that, eh JM?

How about it Rick – can you get Robert to post the model, showing the daily and yearly motions of the sun and the planets. This would be of great assistance for all concerned.

>> We are working on just that and much more besides, John. In the meantime, Bob has just completed a response on the Ian Musgrave article which will post shortly on

www.galilwowaswrongblogspot.com

amd this refutation *will* incorporate precisely the images you refer to, from the CD ROM included with "Galileo Was Wrong".

John, this has been an epic debate and since you have borne the brunt of it I hope you will consider my suggestion to retain a recotd of it and begin going through it so that an article summarizing it might be put together for the blog.

Frank - "JM – Hoge was substantially answered here - http://socrates58.blogspot.com/2010/11/robert-sungenis-opts-for-personal.html?showComment=1288956818132#c7093827402186539973 where I asked for someone to check out my arguments and make a response."And I pointed out that your "response" totally misrepresented Hoge's argument. Hoge agreed that hypothetically for one instant in time the earth might be the center of mass of the universe. But his whole argument, which neither you nor Sungenis came close to touching, was that it [b]would not stay there[/b]. Your little equation totally missed the point and if you can not admit at least that then it will say a lot.

JM – And Hoge was merely using an argument whereby he isolated the solar system in the calcs. I countered with the earth stationary at the centre of the universe and therefore because the universe is so massive, the centre of mass will never move from the earth, regardless of the position of the planets in the local solar system. This is something that you have not addressed at all. By the way, I currently believe Newtonian mechanics is a flawed theory anyway, so Hoges arguments are all based upon a failed model, which therefore invalidates any of his claims. No doubt you will ignore the problems within Newtonian mechanics and the inconsistencies between it and relativity, but then again, this is nothing new with the anti-geos.

Frank -"Scripture clearly teaches a stationary earth and as the scriptures are infallible, then so too, the doctrine of the stationary earth is infallible. The church fathers clearly are unanimous on a stationary earth."And it was shown in that same discussion that only one Father, ONE Father actually cited Scripture about a stationary earth. See it here http://socrates58.blogspot.com/2010/11/robert-sungenis-opts-for-personal.html?showComment=1290047070789#c3146692978619365024. Quite a few more than that quoted Greek philosophers. What sort of a unanimous consent is that, eh JM?

JM – actually GWW says there are hundreds of quotes from the church fathers not included in the book, so even if Palm was correct on the matter of the fathers quoting from the Greeks, how can you be sure the fathers only got their stationary earth doctrine from the Greeks? In short, you cannot because you don’t have enough information. This is yet another flaw in many of the anti-geo arguments. Frank simply overlooks the small sample size and makes his conclusion that only one father quoted from scripture.

Even so, must the fathers expressly quote from scripture for the fathers to be teaching a doctrine has been revealed by God? If Frank thinks so, then it is up to him to demonstrate this principle from church teaching. So far we have nothing but mere assumption on this matter. Furthermore, if Frank believes the fathers must expressly quote from scripture on a truth revealed by God, what then is the place of oral tradition in the church fathers? In brief, Frank has cornered himself with his current position on the fathers. If he believes the fathers must quote scripture and then oral tradition has no authority in the fathers, yet the fathers are part of that magisterial authority, who assume oral tradition has authority. But Frank’s current position implicitly denies the authority of oral tradition which the fathers assume has authority. Yes its convoluted, because Franks position on the fathers is an error simply because he believes the church has not infallibly defined a stationary earth as being art of the faith. But yet again church documents have been cited by Rick and myself, demonstrating the opposite. Again, franks position is thoroughly untenable as being consistent with the catholic faith.

Also if we admit the church fathers quoted the Greeks form time to time. Where else did they get that doctrine about the stationary earth from Frank? Is it found in scripture Frank? It certainly is Frank and that’s why he fathers concurred with only some of the Greeks (who were split in their cosmology models). So possibly we have the fathers agreeing with some of the Greeks and that’s why the fathers were geo’s, or is it far more likely, that the HS who acted with the church fathers, who unanimously taught a stationary earth, based upon the clear testimony of scripture? After all Frank, the fathers were fathers of the church and not fathers of the Greeks. So if you believe when the fathers taught unanimously on the matter of the stationary earth you must believe they were all completely deceived in teaching a stationary earth because they got this false doctrine from the Greeks and as such, the charism of infallibility in the universal consent of the fathers is breached in Franks understanding of the fathers. Lets see how Frank gets himself out of these problems.

You're welcome, Frank. Now, to be clear, contrary to another false claim that a geocentrist has made, I did not post any scientific argument at all, just pointed out to Dave a link to an astronomer's explanation. I have already said that I don't waste my time arguing the purported science of geocentrism, since fundamentally their geocentrist faith is a faith, not a hypothesis of the natural sciences. Granted, geocentrist hobbyists think they are better at science than real scientists, so they would be expected to attempt to explain away the explanation -- but as the hobbyists don't understand physics (nor understand Catholicism even less, it seems -- see below), I don't think it is safe to take seriously their claims. It's wiser to inquire with the experts about such things, not with people who talk about things like general relativity and negative parallax without any understanding of those things.

As for the geocentrist suggestion that Sts. Augustine and Thomas Aquinas would have been hauled before the Inquisition for saying things like, "In discussing questions of this kind two rules are to observed, as Augustine teaches (Gen. ad lit. i, 18). The first is, to hold the truth of Scripture without wavering. The second is that since Holy Scripture can be explained in a multiplicity of senses, one should adhere to a particular explanation, only in such measure as to be ready to abandon it, if it be proved with certainty to be false; lest Holy Scripture be exposed to the ridicule of unbelievers, and obstacles be placed to their believing" (in other words, don't formally pronounce that things like geocentrism are articles of the Faith), we can never know what might have been, but it's not impossible that the Inquisition during the days of Galileo would indeed have condemned them. But then the Inquisition's reasonings and pronouncements (and the judgments and reasonings of the defunct Congregation of the Index) are not guaranteed to be infallible, and its erroneous rulings have been overturned in other cases.

Here is where more of the Fathers quote Greek philosophers than Scripture on a stationary earth. Still not very many of them. No where close to a unanimous consent. http://socrates58.blogspot.com/2010/11/robert-sungenis-opts-for-personal.html?showComment=1290131444674#c8495560181577855117

JM gets all worked up about where the Fathers got their "geo". So what if they got it from the "scientists" of their day. It was their best guess. They did not get it from the Bible because as Leo XIII and Pius XII said that the Holy Ghost did not put that information in there. This was not a matter of faith for them. As Jordanes has pointed out many times, not even one Father says that he considers this a matter of faith.

Then there were these standards laid out by Mr. Torquemada himself,

R. Sungenis: "It is the divine origin of a particular doctrine that makes the doctrine a requirement of belief for salvation, not the majority or common opinion of the Fathers, the medievals or theologians and prelates of today" (Enoch and Elijah, p. 3).

Yup. Exactly right. And the Popes have taught that these matters of natural science are no part of our salvation and therefore the Fathers

R. Sungenis: ". . . no Catholic is under any compulsion whatsoever to abide by whatever was predicted about Israel among even a majority of patristic writers ... even if the Fathers are in consensus on a given topic, we are still permitted to add information that has been gleaned from fresh studies of Scripture" (Never Revoked, p. 12).

Here is the link http://socrates58.blogspot.com/2010/11/robert-sungenis-opts-for-personal.html?showComment=1289482241982#c1154108223494835378

Yup, just exactly what St. Augustine and St. Thomas said, which was then made the Church's official teaching by Popes Leo XIII and Pius XII. Your own guy takes it all away from you. Oh but that was about JEWS. This is about geo.

JM - "After all Frank, the fathers were fathers of the church and not fathers of the Greeks. So if you believe when the fathers taught unanimously on the matter of the stationary earth you must believe they were all completely deceived in teaching a stationary earth because they got this false doctrine from the Greeks and as such, the charism of infallibility in the universal consent of the fathers is breached in Franks understanding of the fathers. Lets see how Frank gets himself out of these problems."

Frank to JM. Frank to JM. Can you hear me JM?

I said I did NOT think the Fathers were unanimous on a stationary earth. You said that but you only have a handful of Fathers who say that and only one cites Scripture and more than that cite the Greeks.

But it is not a matter of faith. Do you get that? If it is not a matter of faith then it does not matter where they got it. There is no gotcha here JM. I do not care where the Fathers got their views on grammar or tentmaking or the history of India. They certainly did not get it from Scripture. That is what Leo XIII and Pius XII say. They could not get it from Scripture because the Holy Ghost did not put that information in there.

And you guys wonder why people get fed up with discussing this stuff with you.

Frank - I said I did NOT think the Fathers were unanimous on a stationary earth. You said that but you only have a handful of Fathers who say that and only one cites Scripture and more than that cite the Greeks.

JM – Your beef was with the fathers not quoting the scriptures in relation to geo and not their unanimous consent on geo. Its plain they had unanimous consent and it’s also plain that you have not yet provided access to all the quotes from the fathers, hence we do not know if they ever quoted from scripture or not on the matter. Anyway, even if they didn’t, I have proposed several problems concerning this line of argument about the fathers position in relation to scripture and geo, which have not yet been answered. Hence, currently there are several unresolved problems which follow from your position.

Don’t you get it Frank. JM to Frank . . . don’t you get it Frank, the fathers and Catholics are not sola scripturists . . . you know that Frank and that’s why your objection to the fathers is very problematic.

Frank - But it is not a matter of faith. Do you get that?

JM – That is your position, which has been pulled apart. Questions have been asked of you, which you freely have ignored so far. Nothing new of course. This is the anti-geo position. Make a problematic statement about the fathers, ignore the problems and then claim the geo is not listening to you.

Frank - If it is not a matter of faith then it does not matter where they got it.

JM – That’s part of the problem isn’t it Frank. The fathers were aware of the scripture texts and wrote consistently with the literal meaning of those texts. Why is it, if the fathers took there ideas concerning the earths motion from the Greeks, that they coincidently all taught the motionless earth, when the Greeks were split on the matter? Was it one of those instances in church history where all the fathers got it wrong and were all duped by the Greeks alone, even though the scriptures clearly teach the earth is stationary? Is this one of those instance when subsequent Popes thought the scriptures also taught the stationary earth, just as the Fathers taught? Is this any coincidence Frank, or did the Popes get this doctrine from the Greeks as well? No, Frank’s position is pure fantasy. The fathers, like the Popes, got their doctrine from scripture and tradition, just like they got the rest of the faith and that’s why Popes and committees set up by Popes have made official statements saying the mobile earth is not of the faith. Frank thinks otherwise and therefore his theory of the church fathers fails.

Also Frank, what of oral tradition and the other problems I’ve highlighted about your position? Care to engage in some serious intellectual dialogue on the matter of your logically and historically untenable position? No doubt you will not engage these problems, because these problems destroy your faith in science and your truncated understanding of Popes have said about the authority of scripture and science.

Frank - There is no gotcha here JM. I do not care where the Fathers got their views on grammar or tentmaking or the history of India. They certainly did not get it from Scripture.

JM - Yet the scriptures clearly and repeatedly teach a stationary earth. For Franks position to hold, he must somehow explain hw the fathers read scripture and then defended the faith, when all along according to Frank, the Fathers didn’t get the doctrine of the stationary earth from scripture, but from the Greeks.

Pope Leo XIII laid out a rule and the way he phrased it fit the geocentrism controversy to a tea. You were challenged to come up with an example of what else he might be talking about. It is one more thing you never really answered if I recall. How about it again.

"the sacred writers, or to speak more accurately, the Holy Ghost "Who spoke by them, did not intend to teach men these things (that is to say, the essential nature of the things of the visible universe), things in no way profitable unto salvation."(53) Hence they did not seek to penetrate the secrets of nature, but rather described and dealt with things in more or less figurative language, or in terms which were commonly used at the time, and which in many instances are in daily use at this day, even by the most eminent men of science."

Got any other example that fits that as well as geocentrism? I think everybody but the geocentrists can see that is the main example of what the Pope is talking about.

So there it is again. The information you claim just is not even in Scripture in the first place.

"JM – Your beef was with the fathers not quoting the scriptures in relation to geo and not their unanimous consent on geo. Its plain they had unanimous consent and it’s also plain that you have not yet provided access to all the quotes from the fathers, hence we do not know if they ever quoted from scripture or not on the matter."

All of the quotes from the Fathers on a stationary earth were numbered out. How many total was it, eight or something? ONE cites Scripture. Four or five talk about Greek philosophers. So much for unanimous consent. Aint there JM.

"Also Frank, what of oral tradition and the other problems I’ve highlighted about your position? "

If only eight Fathers even mention a stationary earth at all then even these other things you bring up don't help you. No unanimous consent JM. Sorry.

"JM - Yet the scriptures clearly and repeatedly teach a stationary earth. For Franks position to hold, he must somehow explain hw the fathers read scripture and then defended the faith, when all along according to Frank, the Fathers didn’t get the doctrine of the stationary earth from scripture, but from the Greeks."

Only eight of them even mention a stationary earth. So your interpretation of those passage is just that, your own. It is not based on any unanimous consent of the Fathers because that does not exist.

I read this thread and my eyes glaze over at the amount of stuff one has to wade through on this matter.

If I believe that God created the all of creation, does it really matter whether He did it literally in either of the two ways it is mentioned in Genesis or by some other means observable through modern scientific means? Frankly, since our understanding of the Sacred Scriptures is still an ongoing revelation, there will probably be those a thousand years from now who will share our Catholic faith who will laugh at both views presented here as naivety, particularly when hmankind grows in knowledge about other dimensions, etc.

Mathematically, if the universe is an infinite plane in all directions, then by definition any point one selects on that plane would be the center.

Further, whether one has geocentric view does not detract from the beauty of a sunset, a rainbow, or that which I see in my wife and children. It adds nothing to how much love I have for my Creator or the awe I have for His salvific plan or supreme gratitude and adoration I have for His Son, Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, or for the Holy Spirit, who still guides the Church and protects it to this day.

In the end, this sort of debate seems to be the kind of thing that is warned against in Eccl 6:11, "There are many words that have much vanity in disputing."

"I read this thread and my eyes glaze over at the amount of stuff one has to wade through on this matter. "

>> My compliments to you for getting through it.

If I believe that God created the all of creation, does it really matter whether He did it literally in either of the two ways it is mentioned in Genesis

>> There are not two ways mentioned in Genesis. There is one way mentioned in Genesis, plus one which is the invention of catastrophically overconfident and incompetent modern historical critics.

or by some other means observable through modern scientific means?

>> Of course it matters. We have a Revelation, given once, and that to the Apostles. That Revelation includes Scripture and Tradition. If we are to accept the notion that the Church had a flawed understanding of the meaning of Scripture and Tradition for 2,000 years until Einstein and Darwin came along to set Her straight, then the question will inevitably become: why in the world should we believe the Church about anything else, if She can have been so stupendously wrong about the meaning of the very first chapter in Her Bible?

So yes it matters very much, and the catastrophe now devastating the vineyard-- loss of Faith in Scripture, in Tradition, in the Church Herself- cannot be explained away or overcome by sentimental appeals.

The questions examined on this thread are vitally important, precisely *because* they make us so uncomfortable.

The Galileo affair is unique in the history of the Church.

In light of recent scientific evidence offering dramatic support for the geocentric universe taught in Scripture, Tradition, and the ordinary magisterium for over 18 centuries, it is, it seems, time for the highly challenging questions pertaining to this affair to be examined anew.

Delano says "It has been our great pleasure to show over and over again on this thread that *each and every one of the supposed scientific proofs of heliocentrism have been disproven under the Theory of Relativity*."

And JM says "Actually real scientists like to think they have a monopoly on genuine science thought. Yet place them amongst thinkers who propose real problems to modern theory, and what do they do? They always fall back to the logical failures of the apparent evidence for relativity and so on. Relativity, like that of helio, is a failed theory to account for the failures of experiments to determine the motion of the earth through space."

So I have seen this kind of thing a few times in geocentrist writings. It is both using relativity when it is useful to them and at the same time saying that it is a failed theory. So which is it?

It is a little bit like the question that someone asked him "Adomnan: If you believe that the astronomers are wrong about such relatively simple matters as the rotation of the earth and our planet's elliptical path around the sun, then why do you accept their calculations of the size of the universe, the speed of light and so on? Clearly nothing they teach is trustworthy, given their utter incompetence and propensity to deceive, as portrayed by you."

And JM said "So I take I you think I’ve answered Hoge’s argument against geocentrism." That is it? Count that as another of the many things not actually answered I guess.

"JM – Augustine is talking about the senses of scripture and the multiple interpretations of the literal sense. Nowhere however does Augustine says multiple literal senses can contradict each other. As the church has understood the literal sense of the scripture to mean the earth is stationary then there can be no legitimate sense in which the scriptures can be understood to contradict this position."

Huh? Nowhere does Augustine say that there can be such a thing as multiple literal senses. Speaking of sense your not making any. But the post that Jordanes posted addresses this. Neither the geocentrist or non-geocentrist take language like "the run rises" and "the sun sets" literally. David Palm says "Both the geocentrist and non-geocentrist agree that these passages are not to be taken literally, but represent the language of appearances, the phenomena that were visible to the observers. But once the geocentrist admits this, he can no longer appeal to these passages as if they literally describe the underlying physical phenomena. And once they no longer literally describe physical phenomena, then no case can be made from them concerning “the essential nature of the things of the visible universe” nor can any claim be made to Leo XIII's dictum concerning the literal sense of Scripture."

The galileowaswrong.blogspot.com refutation of Gary Hoge's latest is complete, I have read the draft this evening and it will be posted in the next few days.

May I say that Gary was the author of one of the best early attempts to refute geocentrism- the famous "satellite post", which to my mind marks the beginning of the modern geocentric blogwars.

Gary was completely refuted, of course, by Mark J. Wyatt, but the exchange remains memorable to this day, and Gary was exemplary in never advancing the argument again, and taking it down off his website once he was able to see that Mark J. Wyatt's refutation was solid and complete.

Here again Gary has come up with an original, well thought out objection, and a real barnburner of a refutation is coming..

Gary Hoge is still alive? I haven't heard a peep out of him for several years now. He completely disappeared off the Internet. But he's back?

I will now close down this combox. 198 is close enough and it is late in the evening.

As I have stated, geocentrist comments are done with on this blog. I'll keep up what I have, which is quite a bit, but in my opinion, the privilege of free speech accorded to geocentrists on this blog has been thoroughly abused, with rampant insults continuing. I've seen enough.

Any future geocentrist comments (anywhere on my site) will be deleted.

I am in private "talks" with Rick Delano and I think there is significant hope (having read his second lengthy letter tonight) for some sort of mutual agreement to ratchet down the Bob-Dave conflict for the sake of unity and peace. Please pray for that. Thanks. I think Rick is an excellent moderator and a fairminded guy.

I have decided (as part of the renewed policy of getting away from all this personal stuff) to delete any post in this combox that is mostly comprised of personal insults and calumnies (on both sides). This is where free speech collides with NT ethics.

If someone doesn't like that, tough. Again, it's my blog and I am the one who may lose readers because of hosting mudfests.

I have principles of discussion on this blog, and the highest priority is to avoid ad hominem garbage.

So I am reinforcing that. I will be removing my own posts and those of some heliocentrists as well, if they are personal, and that includes defenses against personal attack (which most of mine were). The ones left up will deal with the issues, minus personal junk.

If posts (by either side) contain a lot of personal attacks, and also substantive argument, then the latter will unfortunately be the victim of the former.

I continue to engage in hopeful "talks" with Rick DeLano about mutual removal of this sort of material.

--- Marcus Grodi (director of The Coming Home Network, and host of the EWTN television show: The Journey Home)

I highly recommend his work, A Biblical Defense of Catholicism, which I find to be thoroughly orthodox, well-written, and effective for the purpose of making Catholic truth more understandable and accessible to the public at large.

God bless you in your indefatigable labors on behalf of the Faith! Only God knows how many lives your efforts have touched with the truth. . . . God bless you and give you joy and strength in persevering in your important ministry.

There is someone out there who says what I have to say much better than I ever could -- the smartest Catholic apologist I know of -- Dave Armstrong.

--- Amy Welborn (Catholic author and blogmaster)

I love your books, love your site, love everything you do. God bless you in your work. I'm very grateful for all you've done, and for all you make available. If someone pitches a hard question at me, I go first to your site. Then I send the questioner directly to the page that best answers the question. I know it's going to be on your site.

--- Mike Aquilina (Catholic apologist and author of several books)

People regularly tell me how much they appreciate your work. This new book sounds very useful. Your website is incredible and I recommend it regularly to new Catholics.

--- Al Kresta (Host of Kresta in the Afternoon [EWTN], author of Why Do Catholics Genuflect? and other books)

Dave Armstrong's book A Biblical Defense of Catholicism was one of the first Catholic apologetics books that I read when I was exploring Catholicism. Ever since then, I have continued to appreciate how he articulates the Catholic Faith through his blog and books. I still visit his site when I need a great quote or clarification regarding anything . . . Dave is one of the best cyber-apologists out there.--- Dr. Taylor Marshall (apologist and author of The Crucified Rabbi)

I love how Dave makes so much use of the Scriptures in his arguments, showing that the Bible is fully compatible with Catholicism, even more plausibly so than it is with Protestantism.. . . Dave is the hardest working Catholic apologist I know. He is an inspiration to me.

--- Devin Rose (apologist and author of The Protestant's Dilemma, 28 May 2012 and 30 Aug. 2013)Dave Armstrong['s] website is an amazing treasure trove representing hours–yea a lifetime of material gathered to defend Catholic doctrine. Over the years Dave has gathered the evidence for Catholic teaching from just about every source imaginable. He has the strength not only to understand the Catholic faith, but to understand the subtleties and arguments of his Protestant opponents.--- Fr. Dwight Longenecker (author and prominent blogmaster, 6-29-12)

You are a very friendly adversary who really does try to do all things with gentleness and respect. For this I praise God.--- Nathan Rinne (Lutheran apologist [LC-MS] )

You are one of the most thoughtful and careful apologists out there.

Dave, I disagree with you a lot, but you're honorable and gentlemanly, and you really care about truth. Also, I often learn from you, even with regard to my own field. [1-7-14]

--- Dr. Edwin W. Tait (Anglican Church historian)

Dave Armstrong writes me really nice letters when I ask questions. . . . Really, his notes to me are always first class and very respectful and helpful. . . . Dave Armstrong has continued to answer my questions in respectful and helpful ways. I thank the Lord for him.

--- The late Michael Spencer (evangelical Protestant), aka "The Internet Monk", on the Boar's Head Tavern site, 27 and 29 September 2007

Dave Armstrong is a former Protestant Catholic who is in fact blessedly free of the kind of "any enemy of Protestantism is a friend of mine" coalition-building . . . he's pro-Catholic (naturally) without being anti-Protestant (or anti-Orthodox, for that matter).

---"CPA": Lutheran professor of history [seehis site]: unsolicited remarks of 12 July 2005

I am reading your stuff since I think it is the most thorough and perhaps the best defense of Catholicism out there . . . Dave has been nothing but respectful and kind to me. He has shown me great respect despite knowing full well that I disagree with him on the essential issues.

Dave has been a full-time apologist for years. He’s done much good for thousands of people.

You have a lot of good things to say, and you're industrious. Your content often is great. You've done yeoman work over the decades, and many more people [should] profit from your writing. They need what you have to say.--- Karl Keating (founder and director of Catholic Answers, the largest Catholic apologetics organization in the world; 5 Sep. 2013 and 1 Jan. 2015)

Whether one agrees with Dave's take on everything or not, everyone should take it quite seriously, because he presents his arguments formidably.

I like the way you present your stuff Dave ... 99% of the time.--- Protestant Dave Scott, 4-22-14 on my personal Facebook page.

Who is this Dave Armstrong? What is he really like? Well, he is affable, gentle, sweet, easily pleased, very appreciative, and affectionate . . . I was totally unprepared for the real guy. He's a teddy bear, cuddly and sweet. Doesn't interrupt, sits quietly and respectfully as his wife and/or another woman speaks at length. Doesn't dominate the conversation. Just pleasantly, cheerfully enjoys whatever is going on about him at the moment and lovingly affirms those in his presence. Most of the time he has a relaxed, sweet smile.

--- Becky Mayhew (Catholic), 9 May 2009, on the Coming Home Network Forum, after meeting me in person.

Every so often, I recommend great apostolates, websites, etc. And I am very careful to recommend only the very best that are entirely Catholic and in union with the Church. Dave Armstrong’s Biblical Evidence for Catholicism site is one of those. It is a veritable treasure chest of information. Dave is thorough in his research, relentlessly orthodox, and very easy to read.

Discussions with you are always a pleasure, agreeing or disagreeing; that is a rarity these days.

--- David Hemlock (Eastern Orthodox Christian), 4 November 2014.

What I've appreciated, Dave, is that you can both dish out and take argumentative points without taking things personally. Very few people can do that on the Internet. I appreciate hard-hitting debate that isn't taken personally.

--- Dr. Lydia McGrew (Anglican), 12 November 2014.

Dave Armstrong is a friend of mine with whom I've had many discussions. He is a prolific Catholic writer and apologist. If you want to know what the Catholic Church really believes, Dave is a good choice. Dave and I have our disagreements, but I'll put my arm around him and consider him a brother. There is too much dishonesty among all sides in stating what the "other side" believes. I'll respect someone who states fairly what the other believes.

Recommended Catholic Apologetics Links and Icons

Protestantism: Critical Reflections of an Ecumenical Catholic

Orthodoxy & Citation Permission

To the best of my knowledge, all of my theological writing is "orthodox" and not contrary to the official dogmatic and magisterial teaching of the Catholic Church. In the event of any (unintentional) doctrinal or moral error on my part having been undeniably demonstrated to be contrary to the Sacred Tradition of the Catholic Church, I will gladly and wholeheartedly submit to the authority and wisdom of the Church (Matthew 28:18-20; 1 Timothy 3:15).

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